Coat-wearing monkey caught outside Toronto store

Monday, December 10, 2012

TORONTO (AP) — Shoppers at an Ikea store in Toronto weren’t monkeying around when they reported a primate on the loose.

Customers spotted a monkey — clad in a pint-sized shearling coat — wandering around the store’s parking lot Sunday afternoon. The animal made its way through rows of parked cars and ended up outside a set of store doors.

Ikea staff lured the primate into a corner before calling police, who contacted the city’s Animal Services department, said Staff Sgt. Ed Dzingala.

“It was just outside the store, just in a corner area where the monkey had nowhere to go, but it was pretty scared,” Dzingala said. He said the monkey had escaped its crate in a parked car.

The monkey, which reportedly wore a diaper as well, never made it inside the store and was picked up by Animal Services officers within half an hour.

The animal’s owner later contacted police and was reunited with the pet, Dzingala said.

Word of the incident sparked a flurry of comments and photos on Twitter, as well as two parody Twitter accounts which took on the persona of the wandering monkey.